Saturday, August 15, 2009

Kasparov in Quebec Controversy

A Europe-based grandmaster, who wishes to remain anonymous, has just sent me this info about a little controversy that erupted in the last round of the recent 2009 Quebec Chess Championships. Unfortunately the article is in French, but if you punch it into Babel Fish, you should pretty easily pick up the gist.

Lors de la dernière ronde du Championnat ouvert du Québec 2009, une des parties de tête a éveillé beaucoup de soupçons. La partie jouée entre Sergey Kasparov et Vladimir Georgiev décidait de la première place et conséquemment du premier prix de 5000$.

Certains joueurs ont prétendu que la partie était «arrangée» prétextant que les Blancs avaient volontairement perdu, malgré qu'aucune plainte ne fut déposée formellement.

The original can be read here. Basically it says that the last round game Kasparov - Georgiev aroused suspicions of having been pre-arranged and that Kasparov had voluntarily lost. Judge for yourselves.

2009 Quebec Championships
Kasparov, Sergey
Georgiev, Vladimir
C68

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Bxc6 dxc6 5. O-O Qf6 6. d4 exd4 7. Bg5 Qd6 8. Nxd4 Bd7 9. Nc3 Ne7 10. Qd2 c5 11. Nb3 Qxd2 12. Bxd2 b6 13. a4 O-O-O 14. Be3 a5 15. Rfd1 Re8 16. Bf4 Rg8 17. Bg3 g5 18. Rxd7 Kxd7 19. Nb5 Nc8 20. Nxc7 Rxe4 21. f3 Re2 22. Rd1+ Bd6 23. Nd5 Kc6 24. Nxb6 Bxg3 25. Nxc8 Rxc8 26. Nxa5+ Kc7 27. hxg3 Rxc2 28. b3 Re8 29. Kh2 Ree2 30. Rg1 Re3 31. Kh3 f5 32. g4 f4 33. Rd1 Ree2 34. Rg1 Re6 0-1

4 comments:

Denis Jessop said...

The final words in the second paragraph are "despite no formal complaint having been made" in case anyone wondered about that aspect.

DJ

Anonymous said...

Didn't Kasparov retire from Chess? I dont understand this - Why is Kasparov playing again? news to me

Eric Olthwaite said...

According the to Cross Table it was Sergei Kasparov - not Gary :)

Anonymous said...

Havin gone through the game it looks indeed very suspicious, but it's certainly one thing that can never be proven.